Black, White and Yellow

Journalism and Correspondents of the Spanish-American
War
Part Two

By Jess Giessel

On January, 13th, 1898, Conservative forces in Cuba rioted in opposition
to the Autonomy plan. Fearing that Americans would be threatened by the
violence, American Consul General Fitzhugh Lee
sent a pre-arranged signal to have the Battleship MAINE
come to Havana. He later canceled the request, but Washington decided to
send the ship anyway. Due to a communications snafu, Captain
Charles Sigsbee took his ship to Havana before the Spanish government
or local authorities had been informed of the visit, arriving on the morning
of January 24th. For nearly a month, she rode peacefully at anchor in Havana
Harbor, but was at the eye of a growing storm. To reciprocate this "friendly"
visit, Spain announced the Armored Cruiser VIZCAYA
would call at New York. The local papers lost no time in assigning the
most sinister motives to the visit.

On February 9th the Journal added more fuel to the fire by
publishing a private letter written by Enrique Dupay
de Lome, the Spanish Ambassador to Washington. The unofficial document,
stolen by the Cuban Junta, made many unfavorable remarks about American
leaders and called President McKinley "stupid"
and a "low politician". The Ambassador was forced to resign and US -Spanish
relations chilled further.

The evening of February 15th was calm and cloudy in Havana. It was
the second night of Carnival, and the bars and cafes were lively. Rea and
Scovel were seated with Scovel's wife in a cafe near Central Park when
the city was rocked by a massive explosion. The bay was "lit up with an
intense light" Rea later wrote. Making their way to the docks, the correspondents
learned the MAINE had blown
up. Telling officials they were Officers of the ship the pair got into
a boat heading for the still exploding ship. They went aboard the American
Steamer CITY OF WASHINGTON where Captain Sigsbee
and some of the other survivors were taken. The captain was patient but
guarded with the journalists. He later asked Rea to take his dispatch to
Washington reporting the destruction of the ship to the cable office.

In his dispatch, Sigsbee stated that "public
opinion should be suspended until further report". But the papers had other
ideas. Upon learning of the explosion, Hearst called the editor of the
Journal. He asked what else was planned for the front page. The editor
replied "just the other big news". There is not any other big news..."
said Hearst, "...please spread the story all over the page. This means
war!" Over the coming days, as the MAINE dead were
buried and the investigations into the sinking began, no one was sure what
had caused the disaster, except the writers for the yellow press. It was,
they said, an outright act of Spanish treachery. The World, the
Journal
and others fell over one another with "solutions" to the mystery and "exclusive"
stories about witnesses to Spanish duplicity. By the17th, the Evening
Journal's headline shouted:

WAR? SURE!

The yellow press was not alone in beating the War Drum. The following
weeks were difficult and exciting for correspondents in Cuba. As war seemed
more and more likely, some left the island, others were arrested by panicky
Spanish officials. President McKinley tried
to calm the storm, but after the U.S. Naval Board of Inquiry reported that
the MAINE was destroyed by an outside explosion,
the President could no longer resist the wave of popular support for war.
On April 11, McKinley asked Congress for authority
to intervene in Cuba. Ten days later war was declared.

While the majority of reporters joined the swarm of recruits at hastily
opened training centers, shipped out with the Atlantic Squadron, or tried
to get out of or in to Cuba, the first journalistic scoop of the war was
unfolding half a world away. Admiral George Dewey
liked to say that his dog Bob knew as much about politics as he did. But
the Admiral was politician enough to understand the value to a commander
of a favorable press. When Dewey sailed from Hong
Kong for Manila Bay three correspondents were with his fleet.

Joseph J. Stickney of the New York Herald was an ex-Naval
officer and an experienced foreign correspondent. In Japan on assignment
when the MAINE exploded, Stickney wired Dewey
in Hong Kong on April 9th and asked to join the fleet. Two days later,
having received an affirmative reply, the reporter boarded the cruiser
BALTIMORE
which was in Yokohama on its way to join Dewey.
Upon reaching Hong Kong, he transferred to the flagship OLYMPIA.

Edwin W. Harden, and John T. McCutcheon had become friends while
working on rival Chicago papers. They were passengers on the round the
world cruise of the U.S. Treasury's new Revenue
Cutter McCULLOCH. When war broke out and the cutter was assigned to
join Dewey, the pair arranged to send dispatches
to the states. Harden represented the New York World and McCutcheon,
a well known artist, wrote and drew for his regular employer the Chicago
Record.

Stickney asked Admiral Dewey if he could
observe the attack on the Spanish fleet from OLYMPIA's
bridge. "Oh, I think you'll be satisfied" was all the commander said. Later,
he told the reporter that, as the fleet was short of officers, he was appointing
Stickley to be his aide during the attack, thus freeing up an officer for
gunnery duty.

All three journalists were first hand observers of the battle
on May 1st. But Dewey had ordered the telegraph
cable cut, so they could not send their dispatches. Finally, five days
later, the McCULLOCH was ordered to Hong Kong
and the three reporters went along. The Admiral had made them promise to
send his official report to Washington before sending dispatches to their
papers. Harden cheated, however, by sending a bulletin to the World
at the far higher "urgent" rate. It arrived in New York at 4:40 AM. Because
of the difference in time zones, the Chicago Tribune, which purchased
the World's news service, was the first paper in the nation to break
the story of Dewey's incredible victory, 12 hours
before the official dispatch arrived in Washington.

The country soon went "Dewey Mad". The three
journalists on the scene wrote thousands of words about the battle, and
millions more were written in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston,
San Francisco, Peoria, Chattanooga, Tacoma, Emporia and every other large
and small town in the nation. McCutcheon gave the nation its first visual
impression of the action. The Admiral inspired a rash of bad poetry, cheap
souvenirs and instantly forgettable songs that remains unequaled to the
present day.

Reporters with the fleet in the Caribbean theater were having a far
less thrilling time then those at Manila, and therefore puffed up every
captured Spanish merchant ship, bombarded shore battery and small landing
party as a major event. Several reporters, including Davis,
were taken aboard warships, while others sailed on the legion of newspaper
dispatch boats which swarmed about the fleet. Many of these were old filibusters,
such as the celebrated veterans DAUNTLESS and THREE FRIENDS, now racing
correspondents' reports to Key West or Mole St. Nicolas. Admiral
Sampson often made use of these boats for dispatch, agent landing and
war prize duties. Both Davis and Scovel undertook
scouting and spying activities for the Navy and were rewarded with exclusive
stories.

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